This review was originally written for Blueprint: Review.
After robots from space have taken over the Earth, the surviving humans are forced to remain inside their homes indefinitely, being monitored by flashing implants behind their ear. If they go outside, they are killed. However, four kids accidentally find a way to turn off their implants, and see it as an opportunity to firstly find one of their number’s missing father, and possibly end the robo-tyranny forever.
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This review was originally written for French Toast Sunday as part of my USA Road Trip series. It was also nominated for me to watch by Ryan McNeil of The Matinee, and is my submission for August for his Blind Spot series.
Brooklyn, 1989. On a particularly sweltering summer’s day, racial tensions simmer amongst the everyday lives of the inhabitants of a single street. Central to everything is Mookie (Spike Lee), a young, black, pizza deliveryman, working for the Italian-American Sal’s Pizzeria, run by Sal (Danny Aiello). As the day progresses and the temperature increases, everything threatens to boil over, and does so in a life-changing way for all involved.
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Hossain Farazmand is a journalist who has heard wind of a potentially great story. A man has been pretending to be Iranian film director Mohsen Makhmalbaf, and has convinced a family that if they help him out they will be in his next film. Farazmand plans to make this story a life-changing event in his career, and heads to cover the man’s arrest and trial.
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Cyril Catoul (Thomas Doret) is a kid, who wants his bike. He left it at his father’s apartment, but no-one has heard from his Dad in a month. Cyril lives in an orphanage most of the time, but regularly escapes and goes searching for his father. On one such venture, when he goes to his father’s home and finds it empty and unrented, Cyril tries to gain protection from the kind people who run the orphanage by clutching onto a woman, Samantha (Cécile de France), who agrees to look after Cyril on weekends. She also tracks down his bike, from a man to whom Cyril’s father apparently sold it, but Cyril says this must be a lie, his Dad would never sell his bike, and even refuses to believe it even after he has found an advert his father posted selling the bicycle. Samantha tracks down Cyril’s father at a restaurant where he works, but he wants nothing to do with his son. Without a strong male role model, Cyril soon becomes embroiled in a small gang, led by Wes (Egon di Mateo).
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This review was originally written for Blueprint: Review.
Max (Yelchin) is not happy with his life. He works a demeaning job, his half-brother Travis (Cooper) uses Max’s apartment as a bachelor pad, and Max’s girlfriend Evelyn (Greene) is an eco-obsessed control freak, keen to dominate every aspect of Max’s life. He’d have broken up with her by now if they weren’t constantly having sex. One day, however, Max finally works up the courage to dump Evelyn, only for her to die just before he is able to. Problem solved, right? Nope, because Evelyn comes back from the dead, with plans on turning Max into a zombie too, so they can live together, forever. Max is, understandably, less than keen on the idea, especially seeing as he’s just met the perfect girl for him, hipster ice cream parlour owner Olivia (Daddario).
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This film was nominated for me to watch by Mette Kowalski of French Toast Sunday and the Across the Universe podcast. Some day I may forgive here for this.
When I put the call out for people to recommend films for me to review this year, I did so expecting to have differing opinions with some of the people who suggested the films. I know there’s a lot of people out there who don’t necessarily think the same way I do, which is what makes the world an endlessly wonderful/frustrating place to live in. Mette suggested two films for me, and they both came with warnings. The other suggestion (2000’s In the Mood For Love) arrived in disc form today, so I’ll be covering that soon, and apparently I’ll suffer through it, whereas The Tree of Life came with the claim that I’d either love it or hate it, but that I shouldn’t dare hate it. Sorry Mette, I’m feeling rather daring today.
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It’s never a good sign when I begin my notes to a film with an exclamation of my distaste at what I’m seeing on screen, so the fact that the first scrawling for Tetsuo is “Gah!” should be viewed as a sign for bad things to come. This expression of shock and mild gagging was to a man, who apparently is named the Metal Fetishist (Shin’ya Tsukamoto, who also wrote and directed this), cutting a gouge down his leg and inserting a metal rod into it, parallel to the bone. Bear in mind last week I suffered a mild leg injury via bicycle accident (slamming on my brakes when a car turned without indicating led me to rake my leg down the metal grip-studs on my pedal, leaving me looking like I’ve survived a mild velociraptor attack), this visual did not go down well with me. Nor did the wound being filled with maggots. Delightful. The man who inserted the bar into his leg – which by no means impedes his ability to walk or run on it – seems to be turning into a man made entirely of scrap metal. Whether he is intending to or it is happening beyond his control is just one of the many questions Tetsuo throws up that I’m more than OK not receiving an answer to.
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Back in 1987, Jordan Belfort (Leonardo DiCaprio) was an ambitious up-and-coming stock broker on Wall Street but, on the day he received his broker’s license, h also lost his job to the infamous Black Monday. Starting from the bottom, he discovered the wonder of penny stocks, which were much cheaper but garnered the broker a far larger share of the profits, allowing Jordan to quickly create his own company – later named Stratton Oakmont – and rise up the ranks to becoming a ludicrously wealthy hedonist with a penchant for every kind of narcotic available, and many that aren’t. However, Jordan’s wealth and the corrupt manners in which it has been accrued soon come to the attention of the FBI.
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This review was originally written as part of my USA Road Trip series for French Toast Sunday.
For this addition of my USA Road Trip I’ll be celebrating – albeit a little tardily – that great American tradition of Spring Break as I delve into the wonderful insanity that is Florida, home state of FTS’ very own Robert, and he has informed me that it is definitively the craziest state in the whole country. Judging by this movie, I’ll have to agree. Spring Break is not a thing in the UK, or at least if it is I was never invited, and for that I’m grateful. I have a reputation for being anti-fun and especially anti-partying, and that goes double for absolutely everything that takes place in Harmony Korine’s Spring Breakers, a film that, if I were a character in it, I’d have happily remained in the nondescript, comparatively tedious college town at the start because, as I’m frequently told, I fail at life.
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Victor (Gerard Malanga) is a juvenile delinquent. He beats people up and dances a lot, but is apprehended by the police, who re-educate him via brainwashing, until he becomes a better person and less of a danger to society. Not that any of that matters, because this is easily one of the worst so-called-movies in existence. Continue reading
Life Vs Film 